Simon Amstell on Traditional Gender Stereotypes

‘We’re having a baby, but we don’t know the gender, so we don’t know whether to paint the nursery blue or pink. We might go for yellow, just to be safe.’

What is the danger here?! Go blue! Go nuts!

‘But what if it’s a girl!? We don’t want her to grow up to be Bruce Willis!’

And then they have the baby and these sentences pour out of them

‘Oh, we’ve had a girl, but she’s quite a tomboy.’

What is this word? Maybe your idea of what a girl is supposed to be is quite restrictive.

‘Oh, we’ve have a boy but he’s playing with dolls.’

Oh god! Then put him back in!?”

Simon highlights how ridiculous our assumptions about how people should be are. Stereotypes and traditional Gender, Race or Ethnicity assumptions are lazy and ridiculous. The simplicity of this bit is what makes it funny, pointing out how obsessed people are with image, when it’s ultimately pointless.